As with reading, viewing is a process of making meaning that demands that audience make connections between the context of the image or film and its manipulation of its genre.
Genre: The broad category to which the text belongs. For viewing texts, these include photographs, advertisements, feature films, documentary films, television news and a number of other genres.
Guiding Questions:
What genre does this text belong to, and what are the common features of this genre?
What is the context of this text text? In other words, where, when and how was this text produced?
What is the purpose of the text?
What audience might the producer of the text have had in mind when producing it?
What are the main ideas conveyed by the text?
How can we derive alternative meanings from the text? Reconsider the ideas conveyed by the text by focusing specific elements of the image, the way it represents social groups, or even how audiences from different contexts might derive a meaning other than the one that seems to be intended.
Context:
Abu Ghraib prison, Iraq (2004). US invaded Iraq following 9/11. Image came at a time when the purpose of the war was being strongly questioned in the public sphere.
Purpose:
Photo taken as a "trophy" by one of the soldiers. US Army released image as a demonstration that it was seriously investigating prisoner abuse.
Audience:
Photograph taken for personal use and to be shared with the peers of the soldier. It was not taken with the intention of being widely distributed. The unintended audience was created by the military and the media, this shifting the meaning and the purpose of the image.
Ideas:
The evil of which people are capable.
The horrors of war.
Who are the terrorists?
The rise of new technologies in the recording of history.
War as a public relations exercise.
This image was taken by an American soldier at the infamous Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and was revealed by the US Army Criminal Investigation Command in 2004. While the photograph was published in newspapers around the world, it belongs to category of personal photography. The photograph was taken for the purpose of being a "trophy" for a soldier who had abused his authority over Iraqi prisoners. The context of the image was that the US had invaded Iraq in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.
This image is interesting because it has multiple audiences. Initially it was created by a soldier to possibly share with his fellow guards in the prison. However, the release of the photo by the US military changes both the audience and the purpose of the image. The Army published the image as a demonstration that it would not tolerate prisoner abuse. A cynical interpretation would suggest that the Army published the image to head off any possible insinuations of cover-up should the image become public by other means. The war in Iraq began with a significant degree of support, but images such as this quickly changed public opinion.
There are a number of ways to interpret this image. Firstly, the image is a study in evil not of the subject but its author. The subject in the image is completely at the mercy of the photographer. While some might see the pose as Christ-like, I would argue that the pose is designed to generate terror in the victim - at any moment, he might be electrocuted whether or not the wires are in fact connected to a charge. As a study in evil, we are forced to ask the same questions that were asked in the aftermath of the Holocaust. How can a human being do this to another? Are the men and women who perpetrated these crimes evil in their nature, or are they products of the awful circumstances in which they find themselves?
In the context of the photo's production, America and its allies claimed the moral high ground, asserting the war in Iraq as the central strategy in the War on Terror. This photograph came to represent the blurred lines of terrorism. In this image, America had become the terrorist. The result was to completely ruin any chance of convincing the Islamic world that America was fighting a just war. The image was then used by terrorist organisations such as Al-Qaeda to gain recruits in their war on the West.
Another way to think about this image is derived from the way it was produced. By its appearance, it seems to have been made using a mobile phone. This points to the emerging phenomenon of new technologies playing a role in the texts we view. Typically, photographs in the news are produced by expert photojournalists who play an enormous role in the construction of the image. Most of the image that have shaped our world have come from such journalists. The emergence of mobile phones, especially when linked to the Internet makes photojournalists of common people. In this case, the technology was the only means by which these crimes came to light. Moreover, it served to radically alter the face of public opinion in the US towards the War in Iraq.
Context:
Part of a larger called "Campaign for Real Beauty", which was launched in 2004 by Dove, a brand of beauty products. Since the 1990's there has been a growth in resistance to conventional marketing. This particular advertisement was made in 2007 in the United States.
Purpose:
Ultimately, the purpose of this campaign is to encourage women to purchase Dove products over their competitors'. This is accomplished by challenging conventional understandings of beauty. Dove becomes a brand that encourages a healthy view of beauty rather than the "airbrushed" version offered by other brands.
Audience:
For this particular commercial, the target audience are mothers of young girls, although the ad will also appeal to younger women and girls. A further audience to consider are men and boys, whose views of beauty help to perpetuate myths about female attractiveness.
Ideas:
The beauty myth.
The pervasiveness of advertising.
Dove as a brand that encourages a healthy body image.
Lyrics (Song: "La Breeze" by Simian)
Here it comes
Here it comes
Here it comes
Here they come!
Here it comes the breeze
That'll blow away
All your reason and your sin
Same with your minds
So do your best to run away
but take a ref and you will pay
You cannot hide
Here it comes the breeze
That'll blow away
All your reason and your sin
There's no place to hide
Whoa here comes the breeze
Whoa here comes the breeze
Whoa here comes the breeze
Description The spot begins with several seconds of a young girl looking into the camera. Numerous billboard advertisements featuring scantily clad young women are then flashed on the screen. A few seconds of women dancing in a music video is then shown before images of beauty magazine covers are quickly shown. A TV ad for a skin product is displayed before another quick zoom through images for store mannequins. Several infomercial type TV ads are shown that promise to make one look younger, smaller, lighter, fuller, tighter, thinner, and softer. This is followed by images of a woman on a diet eating, exercising and weighing her self on the scale. She goes from fat to thin, back to fat and then loses the weight one more time before gaining it back. After this a quick shot of woman puking into a toilet is shown. Finally several scenes of plastic surgery are shown before cutting back to the young girl walking to (or from) school.
Text:
Talk to your daughter before the beauty industry does.
The Dove "Onslaught" advertisement from 2007 is part of a clever campaign from the maker of beauty products to capture the market by challenging its own industry rather than holding out an unattainable image of beauty that is the convention of the cosmetic commercial. The the combination of fast-paced editing, soundtrack and text, the producers of the commercial persuasively challenge the stereotypes presented in conventional cosmetics advertisements. More importantly, Dove accomplishes what every brand seeks: differentiation from other products. What is interesting is that this product differentiation is not grounded in measures of quality but of morality. Dove becomes the champion of the common woman.
The soundtrack used adds a significant layer of meaning to the commercial. At its beginning it seems playful, but as the camera holds focus on the face of the girl, the music begins to build momentum with the lyric "Here it comes" repeated until the music unleashes the waves of images that make up the core of the commercial. The lyrics work ironically. "Here comes the breeze" does not refer to anything gentle but to a storm "that'll blow away all your reason and your sin".
The use of language is quite subversive. The text near the end of the advertisement (" Talk to your daughter before the beauty industry does") constructs the enemy as the "beauty industry". This kind of language is drawn from the discourse of conspiracy theories in popular culture; for example, "The X-Files" and Michael Moore. The "beauty industry" has connotations of a corporate conspiracy to play on women's insecurities for profit. This use of language condenses all the brands, from Covergirl to Maybelline, under the one sinister umbrella. What is especially interesting is that the audience is expected to exclude Dove from this conspiracy. Dove becomes the rebel standing up for the ordinary woman with all her blemishes, bumps and imperfections. The audience is urged to stop chasing the fake ideal of beauty magazines and embrace her imperfections as beautiful. Most important of all, the advertisement urges women to education their daughters.
The structure of the advertisement has three major parts. Through the use of a zooming montage, we are taken from the close up of a young girl into the world of beauty advertising. The fast rush of images becomes overwhelming accompanied by the inundation of the language of beauty advertising. The rush of images shifts, however, to repulsive images of a woman vomiting into a toilet and gruesome images of cosmetic surgery. The message here is that the barrage of beauty images leads girls on a self-destructive path of bulimia and painful surgery. The advertisement then shifts back to the girl at the start with the accompanying warning to mothers. This structure maintains a sense of hope - it is not too late to change. There is also hope that communication between parents and children can effectively combat the barrage of the media. This makes the commercial all the more effective, placing Dove as an ally of the parents in the battle against the evil beauty industry.
Of course, we can resist the meanings that are privileged in the commercial. Dove presents itself as the champion of the 'everywoman", but its aims are not simply to defend women. Dove is part of a major global corporation and seeks the same goals as every other corporation - profit. This campaign could be viewed as a cynical attempt the harness the frustrations of its target audience. Moreover, the commercial is seeking to sell products that they claim to add "beauty" to a woman! What is also interesting about this entire campaign is its assumption that body image is a specifically female issue, thus denying it as a problem for boys and men.
In all, this is a very clever piece of marketing, and even if we don't entirely accept the motives of the commercial, it does place the troubling issue of body image in the public eye.
Table of Contents
As with reading, viewing is a process of making meaning that demands that audience make connections between the context of the image or film and its manipulation of its genre.
Genre: The broad category to which the text belongs. For viewing texts, these include photographs, advertisements, feature films, documentary films, television news and a number of other genres.
Guiding Questions:
Case Studies
Abu Ghraib Prison
[1]Genre:
Photograph
Context:
Abu Ghraib prison, Iraq (2004). US invaded Iraq following 9/11. Image came at a time when the purpose of the war was being strongly questioned in the public sphere.
Purpose:
Photo taken as a "trophy" by one of the soldiers. US Army released image as a demonstration that it was seriously investigating prisoner abuse.
Audience:
Photograph taken for personal use and to be shared with the peers of the soldier. It was not taken with the intention of being widely distributed. The unintended audience was created by the military and the media, this shifting the meaning and the purpose of the image.
Ideas:
The evil of which people are capable.
The horrors of war.
Who are the terrorists?
The rise of new technologies in the recording of history.
War as a public relations exercise.
This image was taken by an American soldier at the infamous Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and was revealed by the US Army Criminal Investigation Command in 2004. While the photograph was published in newspapers around the world, it belongs to category of personal photography. The photograph was taken for the purpose of being a "trophy" for a soldier who had abused his authority over Iraqi prisoners. The context of the image was that the US had invaded Iraq in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.
This image is interesting because it has multiple audiences. Initially it was created by a soldier to possibly share with his fellow guards in the prison. However, the release of the photo by the US military changes both the audience and the purpose of the image. The Army published the image as a demonstration that it would not tolerate prisoner abuse. A cynical interpretation would suggest that the Army published the image to head off any possible insinuations of cover-up should the image become public by other means. The war in Iraq began with a significant degree of support, but images such as this quickly changed public opinion.
There are a number of ways to interpret this image. Firstly, the image is a study in evil not of the subject but its author. The subject in the image is completely at the mercy of the photographer. While some might see the pose as Christ-like, I would argue that the pose is designed to generate terror in the victim - at any moment, he might be electrocuted whether or not the wires are in fact connected to a charge. As a study in evil, we are forced to ask the same questions that were asked in the aftermath of the Holocaust. How can a human being do this to another? Are the men and women who perpetrated these crimes evil in their nature, or are they products of the awful circumstances in which they find themselves?
In the context of the photo's production, America and its allies claimed the moral high ground, asserting the war in Iraq as the central strategy in the War on Terror. This photograph came to represent the blurred lines of terrorism. In this image, America had become the terrorist. The result was to completely ruin any chance of convincing the Islamic world that America was fighting a just war. The image was then used by terrorist organisations such as Al-Qaeda to gain recruits in their war on the West.
Another way to think about this image is derived from the way it was produced. By its appearance, it seems to have been made using a mobile phone. This points to the emerging phenomenon of new technologies playing a role in the texts we view. Typically, photographs in the news are produced by expert photojournalists who play an enormous role in the construction of the image. Most of the image that have shaped our world have come from such journalists. The emergence of mobile phones, especially when linked to the Internet makes photojournalists of common people. In this case, the technology was the only means by which these crimes came to light. Moreover, it served to radically alter the face of public opinion in the US towards the War in Iraq.
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Dove: Onslaught
Genre:
Television advertisement
Context:
Part of a larger called "Campaign for Real Beauty", which was launched in 2004 by Dove, a brand of beauty products. Since the 1990's there has been a growth in resistance to conventional marketing. This particular advertisement was made in 2007 in the United States.
Purpose:
Ultimately, the purpose of this campaign is to encourage women to purchase Dove products over their competitors'. This is accomplished by challenging conventional understandings of beauty. Dove becomes a brand that encourages a healthy view of beauty rather than the "airbrushed" version offered by other brands.
Audience:
For this particular commercial, the target audience are mothers of young girls, although the ad will also appeal to younger women and girls. A further audience to consider are men and boys, whose views of beauty help to perpetuate myths about female attractiveness.
Ideas:
The beauty myth.
The pervasiveness of advertising.
Dove as a brand that encourages a healthy body image.
Production details[2]
Lyrics
(Song: "La Breeze" by Simian)
Here it comes
Here it comes
Here it comes
Here they come!
Here it comes the breeze
That'll blow away
All your reason and your sin
Same with your minds
So do your best to run away
but take a ref and you will pay
You cannot hide
Here it comes the breeze
That'll blow away
All your reason and your sin
There's no place to hide
Whoa here comes the breeze
Whoa here comes the breeze
Whoa here comes the breeze
Description
The spot begins with several seconds of a young girl looking into the camera. Numerous billboard advertisements featuring scantily clad young women are then flashed on the screen. A few seconds of women dancing in a music video is then shown before images of beauty magazine covers are quickly shown. A TV ad for a skin product is displayed before another quick zoom through images for store mannequins. Several infomercial type TV ads are shown that promise to make one look younger, smaller, lighter, fuller, tighter, thinner, and softer. This is followed by images of a woman on a diet eating, exercising and weighing her self on the scale. She goes from fat to thin, back to fat and then loses the weight one more time before gaining it back. After this a quick shot of woman puking into a toilet is shown. Finally several scenes of plastic surgery are shown before cutting back to the young girl walking to (or from) school.
Text:
Talk to your daughter before the beauty industry does.
The Dove "Onslaught" advertisement from 2007 is part of a clever campaign from the maker of beauty products to capture the market by challenging its own industry rather than holding out an unattainable image of beauty that is the convention of the cosmetic commercial. The the combination of fast-paced editing, soundtrack and text, the producers of the commercial persuasively challenge the stereotypes presented in conventional cosmetics advertisements. More importantly, Dove accomplishes what every brand seeks: differentiation from other products. What is interesting is that this product differentiation is not grounded in measures of quality but of morality. Dove becomes the champion of the common woman.
The soundtrack used adds a significant layer of meaning to the commercial. At its beginning it seems playful, but as the camera holds focus on the face of the girl, the music begins to build momentum with the lyric "Here it comes" repeated until the music unleashes the waves of images that make up the core of the commercial. The lyrics work ironically. "Here comes the breeze" does not refer to anything gentle but to a storm "that'll blow away all your reason and your sin".
The use of language is quite subversive. The text near the end of the advertisement (" Talk to your daughter before the beauty industry does") constructs the enemy as the "beauty industry". This kind of language is drawn from the discourse of conspiracy theories in popular culture; for example, "The X-Files" and Michael Moore. The "beauty industry" has connotations of a corporate conspiracy to play on women's insecurities for profit. This use of language condenses all the brands, from Covergirl to Maybelline, under the one sinister umbrella. What is especially interesting is that the audience is expected to exclude Dove from this conspiracy. Dove becomes the rebel standing up for the ordinary woman with all her blemishes, bumps and imperfections. The audience is urged to stop chasing the fake ideal of beauty magazines and embrace her imperfections as beautiful. Most important of all, the advertisement urges women to education their daughters.
The structure of the advertisement has three major parts. Through the use of a zooming montage, we are taken from the close up of a young girl into the world of beauty advertising. The fast rush of images becomes overwhelming accompanied by the inundation of the language of beauty advertising. The rush of images shifts, however, to repulsive images of a woman vomiting into a toilet and gruesome images of cosmetic surgery. The message here is that the barrage of beauty images leads girls on a self-destructive path of bulimia and painful surgery. The advertisement then shifts back to the girl at the start with the accompanying warning to mothers. This structure maintains a sense of hope - it is not too late to change. There is also hope that communication between parents and children can effectively combat the barrage of the media. This makes the commercial all the more effective, placing Dove as an ally of the parents in the battle against the evil beauty industry.
Of course, we can resist the meanings that are privileged in the commercial. Dove presents itself as the champion of the 'everywoman", but its aims are not simply to defend women. Dove is part of a major global corporation and seeks the same goals as every other corporation - profit. This campaign could be viewed as a cynical attempt the harness the frustrations of its target audience. Moreover, the commercial is seeking to sell products that they claim to add "beauty" to a woman! What is also interesting about this entire campaign is its assumption that body image is a specifically female issue, thus denying it as a problem for boys and men.
In all, this is a very clever piece of marketing, and even if we don't entirely accept the motives of the commercial, it does place the troubling issue of body image in the public eye.
Back to top
Greenpeace: Dove Onslaught(er)
Genre:
Satire
Parody
Viral video
Context:
Text
Purpose:
Text
Audience:
Text
Ideas:
Text
Text
s
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Air Force One "Still Free"
Genre:
Satire
Parody
Viral video
Context:
Text
Purpose:
Text
Audience:
Text
Ideas:
Text
Text
s
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